Fort Worth weekly gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1887-12-30

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their downs though they are now hsvino
their ups. They have worked for thei;
wealth, snd have grasped the wheel n
fortune with their horny hsnds and msds
1t turn their way.
They began as boys to think and Ar,
Sfor themselves and their fat bellies non
shake like bowls of jelly IS they tell ths
stories of their first speculstions. UucIs
Rufus Hatch, one of the boldest. million
aires in Wall street, made his first ven
ture as school boy. will let him fer
the story as he lstely told it to me. Sst
he: "Steel pens had just been intro.
duced into the community. l bought 4,
lot OF them and peddled them out amors
my schoolmates. Pennies at the sge n
seven are bigger than $40 gold pieces At
twenty-ope, and the few cents Cleared
made me feel wealthy. MY next specul,.
ton was turkeys. was, you know, ,
farmers boy in Maine. Shortly befors
one Thanksgiving day I borrowed
500 of my father and bought lot of tur.
keys. shipped them to Salem, Mass.
snd sold them, and my profits were lust
| S29
Rufus Hatch was also 8 surveyor. he
helped to lay out some of the first rail-
roads of Michigan, and he got SIPS 3
day for his services. He once cIerked in
s store where it is said he served all prices
OF tea from one box,and he has served IS
locomotive engineer, and boasts that he
can take spart and put together sny rail.
rosd engine now in use.
Speaking Of Hatch and the tea recalls
how G. P. Huntington, the railway m.g-
nate who Is now worth 10000, 900, ped.
died out butter to the miners of CsIf0r.
mis-. He had three creeks, and his prica
was 35 cents g pound. The butter wss
the same grsde, but when the miner,
wanted anything better he mereIy
came up on the price and
tried s different creek. He tells to-dsv
how miner paid 65 cents
pound for butter which be would nat
take at thirty FIVE, and laughs as he does
SO at the gullibility of mankind. HINT
ington began his butter Operahons early
| He worked as ooy Tor farmer who
sold about 200 pounds 8 week. One dsv
clerk came TO the farm 6nd said that
| butter had fallen zoe on the pound. qnd
that instead of 4Oc it wss only worth half
that amount. Young Huntington here
stepped in and said he would give 25c :
| pound for the LOT, and from his savings
he counted out the price A day or two
lster he sold the whole st 50 cents
pound. Butter had gone up instead Of
going down, and the clerks story was
evidently tinged with fraud.
Adam Forepaugh was 8 butcher in
Philadelphls when be decided 10 go into
the show business He had 8 little circus
and l0-cent menagerie. He paid st one
time Dan Rice S25, OOO a year for hmstH
and his blind horse, and made s fortune
out OF it. The Sells brothers, whose
shows are among the best in the country,
used to peddle tinwsre, following 4
travelling circus snd selling TO the crowds.
Oae OF the circuses that they thus attend
ed failed, and cut Of their savings they
bought it and made fortune. Jay Gould
csnvassed Delaware county, New York,
with his maps at 81 so apiece, and these
maps are now worth $50 each as curiosi-
ties. He was taken in by the surveyor
he worked for, and his first trip to New
YORK. was to sell mouse trap which he
patented. His trap Was stolen, and made
nothing out CT it. His first successful
speculation WAS the tsnnery, which
brought him to New York and to fortune.
Senator Farwell, the man who repre-
sents Illinois in Congress in General Lo-
gan's place, also began life SIS surveyor,
and his first employment in Chicago was
in surveying some school sections nesr
that city. He did the work so
well that he was given jO0
in the County Clerks office at
So per month. He now gets 5000 yeN
from the government, and his check y
good for million and more.
These rich men were not ashamed to
work for low wages, and this has been
the rule of the boyhood of nearly every
millionaire of to day. Andrew Carnegie
who owns estates and newspapers in
England, and who pays one of his fore
men in Pittsburg salary OF $4,000 S
year, did his first work in Pittsburg
telegraph ofIice for IS q week. From
here he was taken to the offices Of the
President of the Pennsylvania
Railway Company, and through
Thomas Scott and his own brain he
got the start which made his fortune.
Tom Scott's father was tavern keeper
and Scott, as young man, was COL
lector of tolls on the canal. lie WIS
offered q position as station master upon
the railroad, and he pitched up cent IS
to whether he should take the position or
not. "Heads is the railroad, tsils the
canal" said he, and the penny came
down heads. He died st the head OF the
railroad, leaving q fortune of between
$4,000 900 and $2O,O0O,OOO, and among
the charities were several gifts Of SjO,UUV
each to educational institutions.
The late Vice-President HOXje, the
railroad man, who was so opposed Dy
the Knights of Labor, Was once hostler
in Des Moines, and George Jones, OF the
New York Times, once kept news olllce
in Albany. The newspaper millionaTes
to-day have generally come from smaH
beginnings. Palitzer once acted as stoHef
on Mississippi steamboat, and ne wore
the livery of a coschmen and drove inc
carriage of man who still lives IN d.
Louis. Whitelaw Reid did Work as
a Columbus correspondent Of
Cincinnati newspaper for 50
week, and the millionaire pro
prietor of the Baltimore Sun began
life poor. Edwin CoWles OF the CleVe-
land Leader, who has now paper winch
pays big interest on million doiiaIS,
can remember the time when most OF tne
WORK upon it was done by hlmsel1, anu
Medill of the C7icsgo Tribune lett
with Cowles TO go 10 tne
of the Lakes and make for-
tune there. Everyone will remember inc
of Horace Greedy and James
Gordon Bennett, and l might 90 on u
cite the instances of nearly every news
osper man of the United States to-day.
1t is the same in every branch OF Lle
md business. Our greatest publishers,
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